Hon Steven Joyce
Minister Responsible for Novopay
19 March 2012 Media Statement
Minister gives update on Novopay Remediation Plan
Minister Responsible for Novopay Steven Joyce today provided an update on progress with the Government’s Remediation
Plan to address issues with the school payroll system.
Mr Joyce announced that a new dedicated Education Sector Payroll Services business unit is being established in the
Education Ministry to co-ordinate the Remediation Plan.
The new unit will be headed by former Chief Executive of Gareth Morgan Investments Group and former IRD Deputy
Commissioner and KiwiSaver Programme Director, Cathy Magiannis.
“Ms Magiannis is a highly experienced leader and operational manager with proven expertise in programme delivery,” Mr
Joyce says.
“The new business unit will pull together all the work being done in the Ministry on Novopay, including working with
Talent2 on delivering each pay period, operating the Backlog Clearance Unit, and supervising the resolution of system
bugs and defects.
“In regards to current work, progress is being made on stabilising Novopay in each current pay round under the
Remediation Plan by boosting the number of staff working on processing pay at both the Education Ministry and Talent2.
“In the last three fortnightly pay periods, the percentage of complaints and notifications received dropped from 2.2 per
cent to 1.9 per cent to 1 per cent while at the same time the total number of people being paid increased from 74,373 to
84,822.
“Following Pay Period 26 this week, the next big challenge will be Pay Period 1, in which significant changes occur for
the start of the new financial year, including adjustments to KiwiSaver and student loan repayment rates. These changes
may introduce new issues. The Ministry is working closely with Talent2 to minimise any increases in error rate.
“The Backlog Clearance Unit is gearing up from 40 staff to the planned 100, and it is intended it will be at fully
operational by next week. The Unit has commenced working on the backlog of outstanding issues from all previous pay
periods. These number about 19,000, and include issues relating to overpayments, underpayments and non-payments. There
is currently about 25,000-35,000 transactions in a normal pay period.
“This backlog needs to be cleared regardless of any final decisions being made on the shape of the future delivery of
the school pay service. It is intended that the backlog be reduced to “business as usual” levels, by the end of June –
when the additional school support funding concludes.
“In regards to bug fixes, 87 defects have been resolved as part of the remediation plan to date, with 143 scheduled for
resolution in a release on 23 March and a further 46 currently scheduled for 20 April. 228 defects are being managed
through business as usual processes and we are looking at a fourth release to deal with remaining defects and usability
issues.
The total number of current defects is 526. These include 49 Category Two defects (very serious), 320 Category Three
defects (serious), 115 Category Four defects (moderate), and 42 Category Five defects (cosmetic). It is planned that the
number of Category Two defects will be reduced to 12 on completion of the second release this coming weekend.